[EDLING:177] (This would rather fit a student research topic.)

[Poison Ivy]

Ave Caesar & Everybody.

I am a graduating senior at ELTE University, Budapest,
Hungary, and am doing my Thesis on mobile phones. I'm
trying to decypher HOW people try to comprehend what a
mobile/cell phone is. I and the team will do this by
deriving it from the speech of our candidates, the way
you people speak about mobiles: what you liken it to,
what human/nonhuman characteristics you give it, how
you antropomorphize it, etc, etc. Lots can be derived
from the slang words you utilize in connection with
mobiles - this is the specialty of cognitive
linguistics, our field of study.

The research I'm conducting comprises a cross-language
and a cross-dialectal project as well: the queries
that we use to generate statistics are distributed
among Hungarian, American and British speakers of
English for the time being. If you help us map your
thoughts and ideas concerning mobile phones, we might
even get to do a grand scale program embracing other
languages like Spanish, French, German, and even
Russian, etc. 

So, first and foremost, I would like to throw this
topic into deep water and see if it floats - [B]what
is a mobile like[/B] [I]to you? [/I]
If you feel you want to help us get the subtle
picture, come and fill out my short query at
www.geocities.com/i_m_poison_ivy/Thesis.html

If you do fill it out, that'll be great help, but any
info whatsoever is welcomed!
- Do you think this is a vain assail or a brave
expedition?
- How can we improve this little enterprise?
- Did you like the query? What would you add? What
would you leave out? 
- Any methodological commentary on the
calssificational / acclimatizational / actual
questions?

Thanks for all the comments, and especially the help &
advice, in advance!
Saiph

PS:
Oh, forgot to add the extra good news!

A Canadian colleague came across this little
university thesis project, and since his theme also
relates to cellphones, he has decided to aid me & the
team in our assail... So, it looks like we might just
get a Canadian Query beside the British and the
American ones in the English section! 
Thanks again for all your help! 

I never thought people would be this interested, but
I've been asked by many Hungarians and even English
speakers to share the results of the thesis queries.
:) They will be available at my homepage above, or if
you don't feel like surfing: You'll find my email on
the Query site above - just drop me a line, and I'll
gladly show you what we ended up with!

My fave up till now:
[I]"A mobile phone is like... a Swiss knife. When I
buy it, I already know that I'm not going to use half
of its functions..."[/I] :D 

PPS: ...okay, the English speakers are finally
gaining:
- Hungarians 67
- USA: 7
- Britain: 2


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